


Fundamental Principles of Inhibition Management

by imagined_melody



Category: Community (TV)
Genre: Established Relationship, Explicit Sexual Content, Fluff, Fluff and Smut, Hand Jobs, Insecurity, Laughter During Sex, M/M, Porn with Feelings, Tickling, with the mildest angst you can imagine
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-12
Updated: 2020-11-12
Packaged: 2021-03-09 21:20:24
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,646
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27532909
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/imagined_melody/pseuds/imagined_melody
Summary: Troy’s history of sexual experimentation, such as it is, has been relatively brief. And during that time, he has discovered something that is now threatening to become alarmingly relevant to his relationship with Abed: he has a tendency to burst out laughing during sex.Troy is self-conscious about a habit he has during sex. Abed helps him overcome it. (Because ofcoursehe does.)
Relationships: Troy Barnes/Abed Nadir
Comments: 12
Kudos: 109





	Fundamental Principles of Inhibition Management

Troy’s crush on Abed happens so slowly, it takes him months before he even realizes it’s there.

For him, being attracted to Abed is as natural as falling asleep when he’s tired, or eating when he’s hungry: an impulse so intrinsic he doesn’t even have to think about it. Abed thinks people are put off by him, and maybe some people are, but Troy is drawn to him like a magnet. Most of his friendships, before now, were people he associated with out of necessity, or who he made connections with because he felt like he _should_. But there were always sides of him that his teammates and acquaintances couldn’t know about. It was friendship, and despite how the movies portrayed it, friendship was transactional. Right?

But Abed isn’t like that. For all Abed likes his world to be governed by simple and predictable boundaries, or arranged in accordance with prescribed narratives, Troy finds he has the least limited worldview of anyone he’s ever met. And almost immediately, he found a place in that world for Troy. To be honest, Troy is used to the feeling of people’s worlds revolving around him, conceited as that sounds—his status as a star football player meant that everyone knew who he was, and they made allowances for him, praised him, gave him all the senior superlatives. 

This is different, though. Abed doesn’t rearrange his world around Troy; he lets him help _create_ it. They create a Dreamatorium just for Troy and Abed (and any guests they might invite in). A magazine, _Best Friends Weekly_ , with their photo always on the cover. Casa Chez Trobed. ‘Troy and Abed in the Morning.’ _Troy and Abed._

He likes the sound of it. He likes it a lot.

It’s such a new and exciting thing that he doesn’t even recognize it as romantic, at first. Troy’s never really experienced the Hollywood-movie version of romance, or even whatever form of it his classmates seemed to have: the kind where your boyfriend or girlfriend feels like a part of you, an indispensable fixture in your life that you’d be heartbroken without. His romantic and sexual partners have been relatively few and far between over the years. And it wasn’t that he hadn’t liked them; it was just that most of the time, his heart wasn’t in it. Sex in high school was relatively easy to get, but impossible to experience in any meaningful way. So Troy’s history of sexual experimentation, such as it is, has been relatively brief.

And during that time, Troy has discovered something that is now threatening to become alarmingly relevant to his relationship with Abed: he has a tendency to burst out laughing during sex.

The thing is, he doesn’t even think it happens because he’s nervous. Troy is more sexually innocent than people seem to believe, true, and he does get a little flutter of nerves when he’s about to sleep with someone. But this doesn’t feel like a nervous tic. If anything, it’s a good feeling—an overflow of pleasure he can’t control. But he has always gotten the sense that other people don’t see it that way. He remembers high school girls who thought he was laughing at them, the rare boy who thought he was trying to hide a freakout or not taking things seriously. It doesn’t matter if he says he’s happy. People, by and large, think his laughter impulse is weird.

He remembers being in bed with Britta, feeling self-conscious and embarrassed and so aware of his impulse to laugh any time things seemed to be heading closer to sexual intimacy. Making love to Britta was fun, and she made him feel so good—but he knew some part of him was always holding back, aware that if he let go too much, the laughter would bubble out of him. He would bite his lip white trying to keep it in, and afterward when the tremors of climax were still sparking through his body, he would collapse face-first into the pillow and shudder into the cushion, trying to hold it back, before he rolled over to cuddle.

He hates hiding it, really. He feels guilty about how weird this whole thing is, but guilty too about how ashamed he is of it—how he takes something that should be fun and stifles it. If he were really as confident as he wants people to think, he’d either overcome his weird tendency or own it. But instead he swallows it down and tries to focus on all the other sensations—hoping that maybe if he forgets about wanting to laugh, he won’t get the urge to do it.

Abed seems content to take things slow, for the most part. Troy knows he’s hooked up with his fair share of people, so clearly he’s comfortable with casual sex, but with Troy he makes no move to rush things along. He lulls Troy gradually into comfort, with weeks of cuddling and making out and every once in a while a hand under the clothes, pressed against warm skin, everywhere but those few most sensitive places he expects it to be.

They’ve been dating for three weeks before either of them finally makes a move. It’s warm outside, but they’ve been putting off turning on the air conditioner as long as they can, neither of them ready to seal off the fresh breezes of late spring and admit that they’re verging on uncomfortably hot. Instead, they’ve been adapting by wearing as few clothes as possible. Annie is gone for the weekend, so while neither one of them has put on a shirt all day, they’d decided by mid-afternoon to dispense with pants as well. Abed is lounging around in only thin cloth pajama bottoms (that Troy has the distinct sensation he’s going commando underneath) and Troy has been wearing only his boxers for the past two hours.

Pancakes for lunch turns into an eighties-music dance party that involves jumping onto every stable piece of furniture in the living room, until they’ve exhausted themselves by shouting the lyrics to every song that comes on their Spotify playlist. (Troy quickly skips every ABBA song that comes up; they make him feel uneasy somehow, and Abed’s frown always deepens when one comes on, so Troy thinks maybe he doesn’t like them much either.) Finally, worn out and sweaty and buzzing with happiness, they trade off taking quick showers and head into the bedroom for a nap. Troy falls asleep with Abed’s hand across his stomach and his head tucked into Troy’s shoulder.

When he wakes, Abed is gently nosing at the skin of his jaw. It’s a barely-there motion, the susurration of his breath and the brush of his nose when they touch, but it’s _doing things_ to Troy. He’s woken up languid and warm, his body responsive to the closeness of Abed against him. Responsive in more than one way, he realizes, as he becomes aware of the slight swelling between his legs.

He turns his head, and Abed takes the unspoken invitation and slides their lips together. It’s a sloppy, heated kiss—Troy thinks it might be half a suave movie kiss and half Abed himself, loose and needy with his own arousal. Either way, it’s mind-blowing. Troy tangles their feet together on top of the covers, smoothes his fingers over Abed’s spine to feel him arch into it like a cat. When Abed disconnects and breathes, “Is this okay?” Troy doesn’t even have a thought to spare for how to react. He nods before he even consciously thinks to do it, watching Abed shift a little further down onto the bed, so he’s level with Troy’s elbow rather than his face.

Abed smooths his cool palms over Troy’s sides and down his thighs, pressing a kiss to his hip. Troy feels dizzy with it, frantic and aroused and not in control of himself. Then Abed, gently but with a sense of very definite purpose, uses his grip on Troy’s thighs to spread his legs apart.

Troy snorts out a giggle—and then his eyes go wide and mortified, and he slaps a hand over his mouth.

That stops Abed short. “Troy,” he says, and Troy lets his hand fall from his face, sheepishly. “You’re acting like you’ve done something wrong. I don’t understand.”

Troy takes a deep breath and lets it out. Something sensitive and ashamed inside him is squirming at even hearing Abed say _you’ve done something wrong_ as part of a sentence. Abed’s words aren’t accusatory, though, and neither is his face. He looks like he’s aware that he’s misinterpreted a situation but can’t work out how.

“I do this weird thing when I have sex, I don’t know why,” Troy confesses, feeling the awkwardness of the words dragged out of him like sandpaper over skin. He can’t decide whether he wants to look Abed in the eyes, or can’t bear to. Abed notices his gaze darting back and forth and hands him a stress ball from the nightstand; Troy takes it with a puzzled look on his face, squeezes it a couple of times absently, and is surprised to feel himself calming down.  


“Do you want to tell me what it is?” Abed asks. “Or do you want to stop?”

 _Abed_ certainly doesn’t look like he wants to stop, but the squirming anxiety-thing in Troy’s stomach is touched that he would offer it anyway. If Troy was so upset about this that he didn’t want to have sex anymore, Abed wouldn’t pressure him to be open about it. He’d let Troy keep his secret, if he wanted.

Troy suddenly doesn’t want to keep it a secret anymore.

“I laugh,” he blurts out. Abed’s eyebrows go nearly up into his hairline. His thumb is soothing along the curved line of Troy’s waist. He feels like laughing now: both because it tickles, just a little, and because it feels warm and good.

Abed stays where he is, draped half over Troy’s stomach, and waits. When Troy says nothing more, he frowns intently. “That doesn’t sound so bad.”

His unassuming lack of judgment makes Troy feel better and worse at the same time. Maybe it _is_ nothing, but he doesn’t like the feeling that he’s blowing it out of proportion, either. “It…isn’t?” Troy says, inflecting it up as a question even though he’s not asking one. Abed’s face goes confused at his tone, and Troy doubles back. “It’s—the thing is, when I’m having sex, I start laughing a lot. Like, any time I get too into it I start doing it. And everyone always thinks I’m laughing _at them_.” In the back of his mind, he thinks, _I really really don’t want you to think I’m laughing at you._

Abed rests his chin on Troy’s stomach. “Why do _you_ think you do it?”

“I don’t know,” Troy says. “I guess sex just feels weird, you know? Not bad weird, but it’s kind of a funny feeling. And I just get all excited and nervous and it just—” he makes an exploding motion with his hands, “—comes out.”

“Like it does when you cry,” Abed says, almost clinically, like he doesn’t understand the general concept of crying but he’s put a lot of thought into how and why _Troy_ does it.

“Yeah, I guess,” Troy says, and then chuckles nervously. “Hey, I guess it’s better than crying a lot during sex.” Abed shrugs gamely, as if that wouldn’t be so bad either.

“I’ve had a lot of sex,” Abed says, like it’s nothing, like it doesn’t send Troy’s mind hurtling into space every time he makes mention of it. “I haven’t really encountered this before. But I don’t think that means what you do has to be weird.” He cocks his head. “What if I made you laugh on purpose instead?”

“What?” 

“Tell me right away if you want me to stop, and I will,” Abed says. And then without warning, he is tickling him.

Abed’s fingers race up and down his sides, into his armpits and over the planes of his stomach, faster than Troy can squirm away from them—and he is _trying_ to. It’s an assault on his senses. The laughter bubbles out of him uncontrollably as he thrashes on the bed. There’s no stopping himself now, not with Abed attacking every soft, vulnerable place his body has to offer with such electric-sweet stimulation. His muscles twitch and his breath comes fast, and he lets go: lets himself be at the mercy of Abed’s relentless tickling.

Finally Abed lets up, and Troy covers his face with his hand and tries to catch his breath. His eyes are slightly wet with unshed tears. He’s not sure whether that’s because of how hard he was laughing, or from relief that Abed isn’t judging him, isn’t put off by the fact that he does this.

Abed is looking at him with quizzical fondness. Most of his expressions outside of character are fairly impassive, but Troy has learned to read the nuances behind them: the quirked eyebrow, the corners of his mouth barely turned up in a smile, the laid-bare affection in his eyes. Abed likes seeing him laugh; he likes _making_ him laugh. And Troy knows: Abed has no better of an idea than Troy why this happens to him—but it doesn’t matter, because he _likes_ it. 

“You’re happy,” Abed says. His voice is matter-of-fact; so many of his statements about other people’s emotions end with question marks, but on this one he is certain.

Troy laughs unsteadily again, just for a moment. “Yeah. I am.” Abed’s eyes light up in a way that makes Troy’s heart melt every time.

Then Abed’s hand is between his legs, wrapping around him, and Troy chokes out a shocked pleasure sound into the other man’s mouth. He’s still warm and tingly from the tickling and the laughing; being touched _there_ , where he’s so sensitive, has the effect of throwing a log on a bonfire. His nerve endings sing with it. He squirms, not laughing this time, although his breathy gasp makes it sound like he is. Abed knows he’s not actually trying to get away. He kisses Troy on the collarbone while his other hand eases his boxers down so Troy can kick them off, and then his leg comes up to Troy’s knee to anchor him still at the same time as he strokes again. This time Troy _melts_ underneath him. 

“Abed,” he sighs out; Abed answers with a curious _hmmm?_ , but Troy doesn’t even know what he wanted to say, his mind absolutely devoid of words. 

From then on, he loses himself in it. Abed’s mouth is on his neck again, teeth nibbling and lips puffing warm breaths into his already heated skin. What they’re doing is simple, all things considered—just Abed’s lips on his neck and Abed’s body pressed against his and Abed’s hand on his cock—but it’s so all-consuming Troy can barely stand it. He knows he’s making sounds, and that some of them are laughter: a little laugh when Abed does something unexpected that feels particularly good, or when Troy makes a needy, desperate sound and feels embarrassed about it. Every time he does, Abed responds, punctuating his breathless giggle with a slightly harder neck kiss, or a squeeze of his other hand where it’s wrapped around Troy’s hip. Those little gestures feed right back into the stimulation and emotional overload he’s already experiencing, driving him higher bit by bit until he can’t tell up from down anymore.

When he comes, he’s laughing at the same time, and it feels _incredible._

It takes him a second, in the rush of sensation, to realize he’s doing it—and then he realizes, all at once, that the release of it is part of what makes this feel so good. When he doesn’t hold the laughter in, it feeds into the pleasure and makes _everything better_. He’s so overwhelmed that he’s gasping for breath in between peals of helpless giggling. 

And Abed—Abed is looking at him, his gaze piercing as he keeps his hand on Troy, prolonging the stimulation just a little bit longer. He looks…pleased. Happy, and slightly amused, and turned on, in a way that makes Troy feel restless and hungry. Absolutely no part of him seems offended or put off by Troy’s laughing. 

“Come up here,” Troy breathes. His voice is still shaking a little, and there’s a needy edge to it that makes him blush.

Abed shifts up the bed, and when he presses their lips together in a kiss, they’re both smiling into it—and still smiling a minute later when they part. Abed stares at Troy, and then he chuckles a little, dipping his head down to bury it in Troy’s chest. The fact that Abed is laughing, too, makes every cell of Troy’s body feel warm. He runs a hand through the other man’s hair and sighs, blissed out. 

He can feel Abed against him, hard and wanting. Suddenly Troy wants to touch him more than breathing. He nudges until Abed rolls onto his back, and then climbs on top of him, his expression playful. And Abed just _lets_ him. He goes where Troy puts him, and then looks up at Troy, expectant. 

Troy leans down and presses a kiss just under Abed’s ear, feels Abed go still under him. Experimentally, he presses one just slightly lower, at the curve of his jaw. Abed’s resulting gasp is barely audible; at the next kiss, to his neck, the same breath shakes out of him unsteadily. Troy feels a smile forming on his lips; he wonders if Abed can feel it against his skin. Delicately but with unwavering purpose, he seals his lips to Abed’s neck—not hard enough to leave a hickey, at least not yet, but with definite pressure—and lets one of his hands trail down to slip off Abed’s pajama pants and wrap around his best friend’s erection.

Abed is hot in his hand, and a little wet at the tip where he’s been leaking, and bigger than Troy had expected. Some still-heated part of him can’t help but think about what that cock would feel like inside of him, but Troy trembles a little at the thought and then pushes it back. He doesn’t want to get distracted right now; he wants to focus on Abed’s pleasure and give him the same kind of release he gave Troy. 

Experimentally he gives Abed one long stroke, applying firm pressure with his fingertips to feel out every inch of him. Abed whines out a “hmmm” sound and lets the rest of his breath out in a sigh. “Troy…” he murmurs in a desire-warm voice. 

Troy chuckles once, low. “Does it feel good?” He asks. He feels giddy and bubbly, deeply satisfied and profoundly wanting at the same time. 

Abed’s mouth is slightly open. Some naughty, sex-clouded part of his brain wants to put his fingers into it and feel Abed suck on them, but he dismisses that idea for now. “Yes,” he gasps out. “Faster.” Troy doesn’t follow the instruction right away; he keeps up the slow strokes, just for a little longer, until Abed whimpers and bucks his hips up to try and get him to speed up. “ _Troy_ ,” he implores, and his mouth doesn’t say _please_ , but his eyes do.

Troy feels lust wipe his brain clean of all reasonable thought. He seals his lips to one of Abed’s nipples and gradually, as he licks and mouths at his chest, speeds up his hand until he’s working Abed at a rapid-fire pace. Abed’s fingers are dancing over Troy’s shoulders and the skin of his back, leaving ticklish trails of sensitivity in their wake as they touch his sweat-sticky skin. He’s making little high-pitched moaning sounds that Troy could listen to on repeat for hours.

It only takes a couple of minutes for Abed to cry out and pulse in Troy’s hand. He’s still sucking at Abed’s skin, so he feels the orgasm by the splash of wetness across their stomachs and the fast thudding of Abed’s heartbeat just a few inches away from where his lips are pressed firm against the soft skin. Troy has a moment of disappointment that he didn’t get to see Abed come; he wants to know what his face looks like at the peak of pleasure, what his cock looks like as he comes. (He wants to bury his face in the pillow again at the filthy heat of the thought.) 

“Abed, you’re so hot,” he says before his brain-to-mouth filter can engage, and Abed moans _louder_. Troy smiles, triumphant and pleased with himself, and bites his lip as he runs his fingers up and down Abed’s sides: not tickling, but stroking and stimulating and exploring. Abed’s eyes on him are blown black and his hair is wrecked from where he was moving his head back into the pillow. He can feel a tremor running through the other man’s over-sensitized body. 

Abed reaches over and tangles aimless fingers in Troy’s hair; his other hand is clenched in the sheets, squeezing a handful of the fabric. Troy leans down a little further, presses a kiss to the juncture of his hip near where Abed’s softening erection is lying across his belly, just to feel the muscles in his abdomen jump. Then when it looks like Abed is finally sated and coming down from the sensory high, he makes his way back up his body and flops down next to him, every muscle in his body loose and relaxed.

Abed takes Troy’s chin into his fingers and looks at him. “Good?”

Troy can’t help but laugh. “Perfect,” he says, and keeps laughing into Abed’s mouth as he kisses him senseless.

**Author's Note:**

> You can find me at [ imaginedmelody](http://imaginedmelody.tumblr.com) on tumblr, where I am always happy to talk about any and all of my fandoms, and where I also am happy to hear any prompts you might have. ;)


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